When Snapchat was founded in 2012, few people expected it to be a major advertising platform. However, a number of companies are using it to generate leads and expand their brand reach. This is one of the many things that you probably didn’t know about Snapchat. Here are some companies that have had great success advertising on Snapchat. These case studies may inspire you to create your own Snapchat campaigns.

Sony Pictures

Sony Pictures was the first brand to ever purchase an advertisement on Snapchat Discover. They used it to promote the new James Bond movie. The movie generated nearly $900 million in revenue at the box office. Of course, this was partially due to the reputation of the 007 brand. However, the Snapchat Discover ad may have also played a major role.

Groupon

The daily deals site has found that Snapchat is a great way to reach their target customers. They reward their Snapchat followers with some of the best deals.

“We're kicking off our new Snapchat account with a week of free stuff. Follow us @ Groupon.com for exclusive deals, giveaways and coupon codes before everyone else. Send us something fun and ye shall be rewarded accordingly.”

NBA

The NBA has used Snapchat to share important news with their followers. Snapchat followers can get the scoop before anyone else. At first, they used it sporadically for important events, such as announcing Kevin Durant’s MVP status. Then they started using Snapchat on a regular basis. For the 2016-2017 series, they began using Snapchat to share news in real time.

“For the NBA, this season's effort with Snapchat requires substantially more investment. But it also provides an additional revenue stream and potentially more attention from Snapchat's growing userbase of 150 million daily active users.”

Boosting user engagement through Snapchat and other social networking sites has definitely helped the NBA brand. It is helping boost ticket sales for all of the major franchises like Homecare Preferred Franchise.

Modelez

Snapchat has been most popular with millennials, so it is a great marketing platform for candy companies like Modelez. A couple of years ago, Modelez started using Snapchat to promote its Sour Patch Kids candy. Their campaigns were actually very successful. Here is an example of one of the videos they promoted over the app. They have been successful by making their videos engaging.

GrubHub.com

Brands don’t only use Snapchat to attract new customers. Some brands use it to find new employees. GrubHub.com is an ecommerce food company that needed an intern. They posted an image slideshow to attract prospective applications.

iHeartRadio

iHeartRadio has been looking for creative ways to expand their reach. Last year, they ran a Snapchat campaign to promote their annual music festival, which turned out to be a massive success. According to AdWeek, they generated 340 million Snapchat impressions in only two days.

“To generate the buzz, the San Antonio, Texas-based company utilized the prime Snapchat Discover real estate on the app that iHeartRadio has only had since the end of July. Snapchat and iHeartMedia seem to have an increasingly important partnership. Evan Spiegel, Snapchat CEO, attended the music-industry giant's Upfront last April, and the two companies held a party together on Wednesday evening during Advertising Week that featured an intimate performance by Alicia Keys.”

The Onion

The Onion has always been known for its creativity. It has created some of the most brilliant pieces of satire over the past three decades. It has applied the same ingenuity to promote their content on social media. They worked with Audi Partners to promote the Super Bowl in real-time. Convince and Convert states that the event helped both brands boost generate more viewers.

“During Superbowl XLVIII, Audi turned to a strategic partnership with Snapchat and The Onion to raise awareness with the Millennial demographic. With the help of its agency-of-record, Huge and Onion Labs, the in-house creative services division of The Onion, humorous photos and captions were created in line with typical behavior people – or their pets – may exhibit during the game. The end results are pretty funny and grew Audi’s Snapchat following by more than 5,500 over the course of the game, reportedly one of the larger spikes Snapchat has ever seen.”